Yess! He's Back

When Fox sports and MSG broadcaster Kenny Albert turned 33 earlierthis year, he received a message from his father on his answeringmachine. "I can't believe you're getting older," Marv said in hisfamiliar deadpan rasp, "because some of us are getting younger."

The message wasn't particularly out of character--after all, the59-year-old Marv likes to introduce Kenny as "my brother"--butin this instance it was also quite fitting, at least in thefigurative sense. Less than four years after the low point ofhis personal life and professional career, Marv Albert hassuccessfully turned back the clock and is now just as happy, ifnot happier, and just as busy, if not busier, than he was beforeNBC fired him in September 1997 after he pleaded guilty to amisdemeanor assault charge for biting a lover.

That his comeback has been so complete--he has returned to fullduties at Turner, MSG and NBC--is a testament not only to hisskill as an announcer but also to the respect he has earned inmore than 35 years in the industry. For what other broadcasterwould Bob Costas voluntarily step aside, as he graciously did forAlbert when the latter returned as play-by-play man on NBC's NBAtelecasts this season? "All along I think Bob felt he was justholding the job for Marv," says Doug Collins, who teamed withCostas for 2 1/2 seasons and is now Albert's on-air partner.

Though his reputation may never fully recover from the 1997incident (witness rapper Common, who boasted last year in a lyricthat he's "freaky like Marv Albert"), Albert says he has gainedperspective from the experience. "Not that I didn't appreciatewhat I had in the past," he says, "but I definitely appreciatethings more." For him that means spending more time with HeatherFaulkiner, the freelance ESPN producer who stood by him duringthe episode and whom he married three years ago. It also meansembracing the role of grandfather, as he has with his firstgrandchild, Kenny's 18-month-old daughter, Amanda.

Not that Marv, a renowned workaholic, is easing up. In the pastyear he added Olympic boxing and Wimbledon to his resume, and hewill cover this year's Goodwill Games in Australia. But he sayshe won't feel he's truly come full circle until this June. "Ithink it'll really hit me when I walk out on the court to do theNBA Finals," says Albert. "To me, there is no greaterfeeling."

--C.B.

Marv Albert says he won't feel he has truly come full circleuntil he does the NBA Finals for NBC in June.

Before he became the premier postseason performer of his generation, the Patriots icon was a middling college quarterback who invited skepticism, even scorn, from fans and his coaches. That was all—and that was everything